Re: Get Out of (Tax) Jail Free

From: Mike Masnick (mike@techdirt.com)
Date: Sat Mar 24 2001 - 16:55:50 PST


At 12:15 PM 3/23/01 -0600, Jeff Bone wrote:
>
>A buddy of mine had an interesting suggestion: how about if every citizen
was given 1
>"free pass" --- a single, discretionary year, their choice, in their
lifetime during
>which he or she could choose not to pay any income tax. Useful for those
windfall
>times, when you're really stretching to buy that new house, etc...

Someone I know once suggested that we have a national lottery (just like
the standard powerball and whatever else "lotto" state things there are)
where the winner is exempt from paying income tax for the rest of their lives.

The theory was that the gov't would get more money out of it since the
amount people paid to play would exceed the income lost from the winners,
and the lucky sonofabitch who won would never have to deal with tax forms
and codes again.

I know I'd play. And this comes from someone who has never played a
regular lottery game (though, in high school I ran the lotto machine at a
convenience store for a while).

I'm sure there's some huge problem with this idea, but I (honestly) try not
to think about taxes as much as is humanly possible. I leave that to the
rest of the angry population.

 -Mike



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